The Wind that Moved Obelisks: An Unusual Traveler in the Imperial Power Sphere
America once sought to distance itself from Europe in order to build a new national identity. Yet Americans in the nineteenth century were driven to anchor their new national identity in the past.
by Miray Çakıroğlu
It is a sunny Saturday afternoon in Central Park. As New Yorkers enjoy the unseasonably favorable late October weather, the oldest inhabitant of the park stands solemnly in one corner against a background of trees. The Egyptian obelisk, known as Cleopatra’s Needle, has stood in the park, across from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, for …
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